The Serious Business Report

SBR #3: The Ladies Love Mario

"Yeah, this game has Mario Brothers 1, 2, and 3," I replied innocently.

"Gimme the controller. I wanna play," she demanded.

Before I met her, my wife hadn't played a videogame since she was a kid. She explained that her parents didn't buy many videogames, but she did have an original NES with three games: the original Super Mario Bros., Duck Hunt, and Super Mario Bros. 3. According to her, SMB3 was her passion for many of those formative years. She'd play on a tiny television set, smacking the screen with the flat of her palm whenever she'd accidentally fall down a pit or run into the business end of a Bullet Bill.

After nearly twenty years, she still knew the opening theme to SMB3 by heart, and was humming along.

She was rusty, but the wide look in her eyes and the smile on her face spoke volumes. This wasn't just nostalgia that she was experiencing, Super Mario Bros. 3 is an incredibly entertaining game, even by today's standards. The game mechanics are perfectly tuned, the different power-ups are balanced and all have their clearly defined roles, and the level designs are still inventive and clever.

Artistically, a game developed on an 8-bit platform has no business holding up so well. The trick is in how Shigeru Miyamoto and company did more with less. Just look at the first overworld map, and check out the dancing bushes. Their little eyes and their movements are so expressive, telling you as soon as you're starting up the game that you're about to venture into a world that manages to be far cuter and more colorful than our own, even with its limited palette.

Starting with the challenge of that first Goomba in world 1-1, Super Mario Bros. 3 gradually introduces new tricks, abilities, and enemies as you play, until you've become a master of chucking fireballs, avoiding undersea foes, stomping on shells, and taking to the skies with the Tanooki suit. You're never at a loss as to how to use any of these new abilities, as the controls are sublimely simple and intuitive. Today's games have gotten more complex and are laden with features, but we may be missing out on something so much better that we already had so many years ago.

Few games are as approachable by novices as SMB3, while still offering a challenge to long-time gamers who seek out secrets or race through the levels. It's rare that you find such a wonderful balance between simplicity and depth.

After a couple hours of gameplay, and years of missed practice, she fell victim to the dreaded Nintendo thumb. That told us that our marathon SMB3 session would have to end, and we turned off the system and went to bed.

I was tired, but I could hear her fidgeting, so I asked what was wrong.

"Mario!" she cried, and with that, she bolted for the other room. The Super Mario Bros. 3 soundtrack was all I could hear as I drifted off to sleep.

While my wife isn't playing any other console games these days, I'm thankful to Super Mario Bros. 3 for allowing her to once again experience the fun that can be had with a controller in hand. Maybe one day we'll play Super Mario Galaxy together and the circle will be complete.

[Gerald has been writing professionally about videogames for nearly a decade, and he still hasn't taken how lucky he is for granted. If you want to know more about him, you can catch up with what's going on in his life through his personal Twitter.]